The previous June…
Buffy sighed as she continued to flip through the hundred or so channels on TV. Here she was, spending the first two weeks of her summer vacation as a couch potato. Her father had come to pick her up five days ago, bringing her to visit him in L.A. and she had spent maybe three hours with him…total. When he wasn't at work he was with his skank-of-the-moment, er, excuse her, his girlfriend. Or secretary, whatever he decided to call her. Buffy briefly wondered if he made her call him Mr. Summers all the time. Then gagged herself until she had successfully repressed that particular thought.
She sighed again, tossing the remote onto the couch cushion beside her. Dawn was one lucky little bitch. She was currently at summer camp, and unfortunately couldn't make it to the yearly visit to their father, which Buffy was sure just broke him up inside. Note the sarcasm.
Okay, that's it. Buffy stood and stretched her arms above her head, yawning. Then she went in search of her shoes. Here she was, in L.A., with some of the best shopping available to a young woman such as herself, and she was spending her time cooped up in her father's condo watching daytime…and afternoon, and evening, and late night television, just hoping her dad would decide to maybe have lunch with her. Well, no more. She had enough cash for a cab, and her mom had been so kind as to give her one of her credit cards for the duration of her visit, so she may as well use it, right? She looked up a cab company in the phone book, called and got a cab to pick her up, and left a short note for her father in case he actually noticed she was gone.
"So where to, miss?" the cabbie asked her over his shoulder.
"Take me where there's shopping," she sighed happily.
"The Plaza okay?"
"Sounds great."
Buffy smiled as she caught sight of The Plaza, a sprawling mall with three floors and several famous department stores. Oh, yes, she could spend her days here.
"Thanks," she handed the cabbie her fare.
"No problem. Hey you give us a call when you want to leave, alright?"
"Okay," she grinned as she stepped out of the cab, her mood improving my the minute.
After three hours, Buffy's tummy was making with the gurglies, so she and her five new outfits, two pairs of shoes, and various trinkets made their way to the food court. She strolled by the assortment of eateries, stopping dead when she caught sight of a huge Chinese buffet. And we have a winner, she thought as she stepped in line.
Right…behind…oh, no. No way. No! This trip was sucking enough all on it's own, she really, really didn't need--
"Spike?!"
The unmistakably bleached blond head whipped around, disdain immediately settling on his features as he recognized the particular voice which screeched his name. Fan-bloody-tastic.
"Buffy."
"What the hell are you doing here?"
"Well, being as I'm standing in line at a Chinese buffet, I'd say I'm getting ready to eat," he explained to her as if she was a small child, earning him a death glare.
"Thanks, I got that. What are you doing in L.A.? Shouldn't you be juvenile delinquent-ing back in Sunnydale?"
He shot her a deadly glare of his own, before answering, "I've got business here." He turned around to grab a plate and began spooning white rice onto it.
Buffy rolled her eyes, grabbing her own plate and filling it. Mmm…fried rice, dim sum, chicken and broccoli, lo mein--
Buffy and Spike's hands collided while both reaching for the lo mein spoon, then they turned to glare at each other. Suddenly Spike gave her a charming grin.
"Ladies first," he said, gesturing a la Vanna White to the noodles.
Just as Buffy reached for the spoon, Spike snatched it up and dumped some lo mein onto his plate. "But, seeing as I don't see any ladies here, I guess I'll just go ahead." He turned to smirk at her before going to pay for his meal.
Buffy growled under her breath as she finished gathering up her food, then followed Spike to pay. He was waiting for her by the trash can next to the register. How fitting. She continued to walk past him, turning back around when she noticed he had followed her.
"What are you doing?" she snapped.
Spike shrugged. "What? I can't sit and have a meal with a fellow Scoobie?"
"The fellow Scoobies aren't here. And you and I both know they are the only reason we can stand each other's presence. You can go now." She set her plate on a nearby table, then placed one of her shopping bags in three of the chairs, sitting down in the fourth. She closed her eyes and prayed for inner peace as Spike calmly removed the bag from the chair adjacent to her and sat down in it.
"So what are you doing here in the City of Angels?"
Buffy narrowed her eyes at his obvious phrasing. "What the hell are you doing?"
His face became the picture of innocence. "I don't know what you mean."
"I know the only reason you're sitting here is to irritate me."
"Yeah…" he smiled gleefully. "But I'm also curious. So tell me."
"Well what are you doing here?"
He stared at her a moment, smirking, before he shrugged and answered. "I've got a gig."
"A what now?"
"A gig. A show. A performance."
"Performing what?"
This time he was slightly more hesitant about answering, shifting in his seat and mumbling something.
"What was that?" Buffy asked.
"I sing." He looked up sharply, glaring her a warning not to--
Buffy burst out laughing. "Oh. My. God. Spike the big bad drummer sings! Oh, man, you've got to give me a show, choirboy!"
"'S not a bleeding choir! I'm in a band. I sing and play guitar."
"What kind of band?" she asked, wiping at her eyes.
He shrugged. "We do covers, mostly. Uh, some Nirvana, Springsteen, good rock stuff."
"Wow. Gotta say, it's hard to believe. Also hard to believe is we've almost had a whole conversation without the usual attempted murder."
"Always knew you thought I was sexy," he smirked.
"And we're back to the murderous thoughts."
Spike grinned at that. "Well, I spilled. Your turn."
Buffy sighed heavily. "I'm here visiting my dad. Kind of. I've barely seen him. He's either at work or working his girlfriend slash secretary."
"Ouch. Da's got a new bint, does he?"
"Yeah. Major skank."
"So you've been spending your lonely days at the mall, then?"
"Actually, this is trip number one. I've been watching lots and lots of bad TV. Ugh, there's this one really awful soap opera that I for some reason keep watching. I have no idea what's going on, but there's this doll who's really a boy or he's a boy who's really a doll or something--"
"Passions," Spike cut in. "Bloody great show."
Buffy grinned. "You do realize that this, plus the fact that you like to sing, is giving me serious fuel for when we get back to school, right?"
"At any rate," he rolled his eyes, "if you're so bored, we're playing tonight at 14 Below. You should come."
"Y'know, I'm actually desperate enough to take you up on that offer."
"Ah, so now you're desperate for me. I'm flattered, pet."
"Hmm, murderous thoughts plus the urge to vomit. That's a new one."
"Really? You inspire that feeling in me almost constantly."
"Funny."
As they continued their meal, Buffy and Spike worked out what time the band was going to be playing and where the club was. All was done in an almost civilized manner, and the ever-present jabs and insults seemed to be done in more of a playful way than anything. It finally creeped both of them out enough to hurry through the last few bites of food and go their separate ways.
When the cab dropped Buffy off at home, she was unsurprised to see the condo as empty as she had left it. Oh, wait. There was a different note left in the same place hers had been on the refrigerator. So her father had come and gone, it seemed, over to his skank's house. Big shocker there. Sighing, she grabbed another piece of paper to scribble down that she was going out to a club tonight, and she'd be home by midnight. Kinda sad that the note communication was actually a step up.
It was almost seven o'clock, and Spike had said their set began at nine. That gave her an hour and some change to get ready, and maybe get there a bit early and check out the club. She took a quick shower and began picking out something to wear. She hadn't brought much in the way of clubby-type clothes, anticipating a dull visit. Luckily, she'd bought a new leather skirt and a red halter top, the material clingy in the front and almost completely absent in the back, the shirt held on her body with a series of crisscrossing strings. After applying her makeup to give her eyes a dark, smoky look, accented with just the softest iridescent pink lip gloss, she squeezed some styling gel into her hands, running her fingers through her damp hair and crinkling the strands to maintain that untamed wet look.
She stared at herself in the mirror. She looked…pretty damn hot, if she did say so herself, but more than that, she looked…different than herself. She even had on a pair of chunky black boots, also newly bought. What made her go for this look? Eh, whatever. She looked good. She shrugged and called her cab.
As soon as she set foot in the club, Buffy immediately liked it. The interior was dimly lit with red and blue spotlights, and there must've been a smoke machine somewhere, as a mist filled the room. The stage was actually quite large, the rest of the club centered around it. There was a bar across the way, and she headed over to order a drink.
She sat on one of the barstools sipping on her virgin strawberry daiquiri, when most of the lights on the dance floor went out and the stage lights switched on. She stood and made her way closer to the stage as she saw Spike step up to the microphone, slipping the strap of the waiting guitar over his head to settle across his left shoulder. Without any introduction of any kind, he ripped into the first chord and began singing a fast paced song, quickly sending the crowd into a riotous frenzy. Buffy did her best to dodge the thrashing bodies, then gave up, adopting the "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" technique, and began dancing wildly herself.
Which, unfortunately, quickly became very tiring, but the next song they played seemed like it would be slower-paced. Ooh! Buffy recognized this one. She couldn't remember the name of the song, but she knew it was by Nirvana. Hmm…maybe "I Don't Have A Gun?" He repeated that line a few times. Soon the song was over, but instead of getting ready to play again, Spike and his bandmates began packing up their instruments, as Spike bid the crowd thanks and goodnight. Buffy frowned at the short show, then wandered back over to the bar to sit down.
As another band was taking the stage, she heard a familiar voice ask from behind her, "Is this seat taken, luv?"
She swiveled around on her barstool and saw Spike standing before her, his forehead still glistening from the heat of the spotlights onstage.
Buffy nodded her head toward the seat next to her, which Spike took. He settled in, then ordered a bottled water from the bartender, which he promptly guzzled down.
"So what's with the short show?" Buffy asked somewhat loudly, to be heard over the other band which had started to play.
"We're just an opening act, pet. You think a high school garage band would make a headliner or something?" he said loudly back.
"Well if you'd told me it was gonna be so lame, I wouldn't have bothered coming," she snarked.
Spike rolled his eyes. "Yeah, cause you had so much going on anyway."
"Shut up."
They sat quietly nursing their drinks for a few moments. Now that the requisite insults had been issued, Buffy felt like she could begin an actual conversation.
"I liked the second song you guys did…the, um, Nirvana one? I can't remember the name of it."
"Oh, yeah, 'Come As You Are.' Bloody great song by a bloody great band." Apparently Spike felt the same way. "Right shame about Kurt Cobain's murder."
"I thought he committed suicide?"
"Psshhh," he waved her off. "Whole thing was a set-up. If you've seen the so-called suicide note he left, you could clearly see that they were song lyrics, and the part written about him offing himself was in a completely different handwriting."
"Huh. Did not know that."
"Yup."
Buffy frowned as a thought suddenly occurred to her. "So you're uncle just lets you go to L.A. whenever you want to do these gig thingies?"
Spike shrugged. "'S my car. My petrol money. We get paid. Ol' Uncle Ethan can't really complain about anything."
"But where do you stay while you're here? I know you're not eighteen yet, so how could you get a hotel room?"
Spike grinned before pulling his wallet out of his back jeans pocket. "That's not what my I.D. says," he smirked, pulling out a California driver's license which listed his birthday a year before it really was. "The trick is to go for exactly eighteen. You still look exactly the same as when you're seventeen."
Buffy held the card close to her face, inspecting it for flaws. "Pretty nice. I bet you've got one that says you're twenty-one, too, huh?"
"Of course."
"Lemme see," she held out her hand.
"No bloody way."
"C'mon!"
Spike sighed heavily, before leaning forward and staring right into Buffy's eyes. "Listen to me. If I show you, you have to promise that what you see will never leave this club, and you won't ever talk about it. Savvy?"
"Uh…sure," Buffy frowned at his sudden and overly-dramatic seriousness.
"Right then." He then pulled another card out of his wallet, snatching it back as Buffy reached out for it. "Swear it," he repeated.
Buffy rolled her eyes as she complied. "I swear I won't ever tell anyone about anything that I see."
"Okay," he mumbled as he handed the card over. Buffy took one glance down at the picture, and then her eyes flew back up to Spike, who immediately raised a finger in warning. "And don't even bloody think about laughing, you bint!"
"Too late!" Buffy burst out laughing, guffawing even as she dodged Spike's attempts at reclaiming the card. "Oh. My. GOD! What the hell is up with your hair?!? And the glasses! Oh…oh, man. Whoo!" Buffy fanned herself with said I.D. card as she calmed down. She drank the rest of her daiquiri and returned her attention to Spike's picture. "Seriously though, what the hell did you do, wear a disguise for this picture?"
"No," Spike grumbled.
"Then what?"
"I used an old school picture from when I still lived in London, alright?"
"Uh, okay. Why?"
"Well, the logic works just the opposite for fake twenty-one-year-old I.D.'s as it does for eighteen-year-old ones. If you look extremely different from your picture, but are clearly the same person, anyone checking would be more inclined to believe it was real."
"Makes sense," she nodded thoughtfully, before relinquishing such wonderfully incriminating evidence back to its owner. "So you really walked around looking like that?" she couldn't help but one last tease.
"Knew I bloody well shouldn't have shown you. But now you see that there was a reason for the change in look, yeah?"
"Oh yeah," she grinned.
Just then, the band onstage started up a particularly good beat, and Spike stood from his barstool and touched Buffy's upper arm. "C'mon," he said.
"What?" she frowned.
"Well, this is a club, Goldilocks, howsabout making use of it?"
"Again I ask the question."
"Bloody hell," he muttered, shaking his head towards the heavens. "Dancing, pet. How about we go dance?" he asked as if he were speaking to a retarded chipmunk.
"Oh. Well why didn't you say so?" she said as she rose from her seat, leading the way onto the dance floor. Spike grit his teeth and followed behind.
They danced among the other clubbers, the band playing fairly upbeat and fast music. After about three of those songs, however, they strummed a few chords of what was obviously going to be a slow song. Buffy and Spike glanced awkwardly at each other, then almost simultaneously turned to leave the floor. Their progress was halted however, by the throngs of couples joining together who had been waiting for a slow song to dance to. Seeing that their way was blocked, the two teens uneasily drifted back together, Spike's hand's coming to rest on Buffy's hips as hers grasped his shoulders, both of their arms still stock-straight and leaving plenty of room for the holy ghost in between them.
They swayed back and forth in an extremely uncomfortable silence for a few moments, before it all got to be too much for Buffy, and she said the first thing that popped into her head.
"You sing pretty well."
Spike looked down at her with a slightly surprised look on his face. "Uh, thanks." Oddly feeling as though it was 'his turn,' he said, "You look nice tonight."
This time, both faces looked shocked at what he just said. "Uh, that is," he continued, "I can stand to look at you for longer than three seconds without wanting to heave."
"Gee, thanks," she laughed.
"You know what I mean," he grumbled.
"Yes. I do. And thank you. I think."
As the song continued, both pairs of arms slowly relaxed, and the couple drew closer together without either party being entirely aware. At last the song drew to a close, and they separated, each feeling oddly lonely at the loss of contact. Buffy glanced down at her watch.
"Oh, shoot."
"Bang."
"Shut up. It's eleven-thirty. I told my dad…well, actually…wrote to my dad and told him I'd be home by midnight. I have to go call a cab."
"Piffle," he waved that idea off. "I'll give you a lift."
"Um, okay."
Together they made their way out to Spike's car, the big, black Desoto that she had dubbed 'the Beast.' Spike opened her door from her seemingly out of habit, but the weird thing was that she didn't think it was weird. Weird.
The ride back to Buffy's father's was made mostly in a surprisingly comfortable silence, not counting Spike's constant flipping through radio stations.
Buffy rolled her eyes at his erratic behavior. "Sheesh, Spike, ever think about getting tested for ADD or something?"
"Yeah right," he smirked. "Can you imagine me on Ritalin?"
"Good point."
As he pulled up in front of the condo, Buffy made a split-second decision to keep following the pattern of weirdness of the night and her not-like-her behavior. She turned in her seat to face Spike.
"So do you guys have a gig thingy tomorrow?"
"Uh, no. Next one is in three days, and that's the last one we're doing in town. Why?"
"No reason. Well, yes, okay, obviously there was a reason. I was just thinking, neither of us have anything better to do, and it's not like we know a lot of people here, so I was wondering if we should, you know, hang. Together. Or something."
Spike regarded her for a moment, as though trying to figure out if she was being sincere or not. Apparently he decided she was, because he nodded. "Yeah, sure. Sounds like a plan."
Buffy grinned so genuinely, Spike couldn't help but reciprocate. "Okay then. Why don't you just come over here tomorrow, say, around noon-ish?"
"Noon?"
Buffy shrugged. "What? It's summer vacation. I like to sleep in."
"Girl after my own heart. Noon it is, then."
"'Kay. See you tomorrow," she stepped out of the car.
"Ta, luv."
Buffy made her way up to the door, and noticed that she only heard Spike drive away after she'd unlocked and opened it, like he was making sure she got in okay or something. Weird.
And they had maintained almost civilized behavior for the better part of four hours. Double weird.
And they were getting together the following day. Triple weird.
Weird. Weird. Weird.
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AUTHOR'S NOTE: Holy hell! An update! The world is ending, folks, this is a sure sign of the apocalypse! Hey, Satan, how's that ice fishing coming? I don't think I need to say how horribly ashamed of myself I am for abandoning this fic and it's loyal readers for so long. I'm a bad, rude, girl. But I hope this will in some way make up for it. I'm feeling the creative juices flowing again, and my fucked up life might just be making some room for more writing in it somewhere. I'm sorry for cutting this chapter off, but it was just getting too damn LONG. We'll get to see the rest of the story of how these two crazy kids got together in the next chapter, which will be up in FIVE DAYS! That's right, you heard me. Five days. I'm giving myself a deadline so I get the damn thing done! I've already got most of it handwritten (which I was doing instead of taking notes in my climatology class, but hey, we all have priorities) so I just need to type it up and finish it. Oh, one last thing. Just to let everyone know, I have never in my life been to California, therefore never been to L.A., and therefore never been to the club 14 Below. I am making this shit up. It's called fanFICTION, people! Okay, I think I've said my piece. I love you all!
Lata,
Coquine (coquinespike@yahoo.com)
NEXT CHAPTER UP IN FIVE DAYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
